A firm hoping to invest £10m to replace phone boxes in Newcastle with digital terminals has defended itself against accusations that they are just ‘Trojan horses’ for advertising.

Civic centre bosses have complained that they are fed up with the ‘turmoil’ caused by a huge influx of planning applications for new telephone boxes, which critics say will act as little more than advertising billboards.

But Matt Bird, general manager of InLink UK, is adamant that his company’s products will ‘make a difference to communities’ and are superior to those of other firms, which it has been claimed are trying to exploit a loophole in the law to bypass advertising regulations.

Since launching a partnership with BT last year, more than 150 InLink units have been installed across the country - providing free ultrafast 1GB wifi, phone calls and mobile charging - and around 35 are planned for Tyneside.

The firm has secured planning permission for five in Newcastle and seven in Gateshead, but has already seen many other plans rejected on the grounds that they will be “intrusive” and lead to “street clutter”.

Matt Bird, general manager of InLink UK (Image: InLink UK)

Mr Bird said: “In one week we had 40,000 phone calls on our units. It is not an afterthought, they are used. It is absolutely a product that is loved and engaged with by the communities we are trying to go into.

“We believe that these products should be the best technically in size, speed, and cost - but they should not be compromised.

“All of that has to be paid for. We get our revenue from advertising.”

He added: “Unlike some others, we aren’t just a traditional old payphone with an advertising board.

“We are really passionate about the products and services we provide actually being the best that they possibly could be.

“But we make our money from advertising.

“There is no Trojan horse, we aren’t hiding what our business case is.”

InLinkUK had wanted to have units installed in Newcastle in time to offer free wifi for the Great Exhibition of the North - but saw those hopes dashed and were accused by former city planning committee chair George Allison of being “just the same as the others - just advertising”.

Mr Bird said: “The Great Exhibition of the North is a fantastic opportunity for everyone involved there.

“We wanted to support that, we wanted to engage proactively.

“We were trying to support the drive for the Great Exhibition. Unfortunately, we have not been totally able to do so.

“The exhibition has started and we are putting our units in in a couple of weeks’ time, but we will still be able to offer our services for some of the exhibition and way beyond that.”

While admitting that there is ‘a bit of mistrust’ from councils, Mr Bird has pledged to engage with civic centre bosses and work with them to avoid a huge backlog of applications.

He added: “ Council officers are having to deal with so much, and we try to be collaborative from the outset.

“If they say that they can’t handle the volume of applications, then we will delay them - that is a very common conversation that we have.

“I acknowledge that there are other people out there who are taking a payphone and putting a digital screen on the back, and that is creating a large volume of that.

“But we get swept up in that noise and activity.

“We do engage, we want to talk, and we do make compromises.”

Under the current law, companies only need a licence from Ofcom to install a telephone box - rather than requiring full planning permission.

Councils can object, but the applicant can then appeal to the Government’s planning inspectorate - which Newcastle councillors heard earlier this year is “drowning” under the weight of the appeals.

According to InLink UK, it has already provided more than 2.5m wifi sessions to more than 100,000 registered users, as well as in excess of 587,000 free phone calls.

It is estimated that the cost of installing and maintaining the units in Newcastle is £9.9m.

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A council spokesperson said: “Our planning team has received 49 applications for BT InLink kiosks since December 2017. We have determined 94 per cent of them within the statutory time frame. Each application is assessed individually against national and local planning policy.

“We appreciate that BT believe passionately in their product but the city council needs to assess the benefits that the kiosks may bring against any harm to the street through clutter or highway safety.”